Xiaomi Redmi 4 Review: Hail the new budget king

Xiaomi India is slowly and steadily picking up pace with its new device launches. In late 2016, the company launched the Redmi 3s and Redmi 3s prime budget Android smartphones.Karan Bajaj | ET Bureau | May 23, 2017, 11:38 IST

Xiaomi India is slowly and steadily picking up pace with its new device launches. In late 2016, the company launched the Redmi 3s and Redmi 3s prime budget Android smartphones.

Usually, Xiaomi lets one smartphone model to be in the market for close to a year’s time before a successor is launched. However, within 6 months of the launch of Redmi 3s range, Xiaomi has launched the successor to the phone, Redmi 4.

Redmi 3s and 3s prime scored sparked the metal body design revolution in the sub-Rs 10,000 segment last year. Now, the Redmi 4 brings an all new design language on the table.

The phone is a looker with its curved sides, rounded edges, matte metal body and full glass front. On the back is the camera module that sits flush with the body and the fingerprint scanner placed in the center.

Xiaomi has included the fingerprint scanner even on the entry level Rs 6,999 – a welcome move considering the Redmi 3s lacked a fingerprint scanner at the same price. What we liked more was the phone’s compact design – it is overall smaller than the Redmi 3s and even the Redmi 4a - everyone who saw the phone was instantly impressed with its looks, design and overall ergonomics.

On the front is a 5-inch IPS display with a resolution of 1280 x 720 pixels that is covered by 2.5D curved glass. With its slim bezels, vibrant colours and wide viewing angles, Redmi 4’s display is one of the best we have seen on a sub Rs 10,000 smartphone.

However, the capacitive touch buttons under the display are not backlit – for the entry level Rs 6,999 phone we can overlook this, but even the Rs 10,999 variant skips out on backlit buttons which is a letdown.

Under the hood is an octa core Snapdragon 435 processor, a 4,100mAh battery and option of 2/3/4GB RAM along with 16/32/64GB storage. Our review unit is the 3GB RAM + 32GB storage variant priced at Rs 8,999. With this configuration, we could play full HD videos without a hitch.

Most games ran smoothly – it was only the graphic intensive games that the phone had issues playing with a smooth frame rate. Navigating the user interface, launching apps and even switching between running apps was a breeze – at any given point we had over 1GB RAM available for use, even if there were over 15 apps running in the background.

Battery life is stellar – with heavy usage of voice calls and constant 4G/WiFi connectivity, the phone easily managed to last close to one and half days. With light usage, it managed to last up to 2 days. Moreover, there is support for fast charging, so the large 4,100mAh battery only takes about 1.5-2 hours to charge once drained.

The phone comes with MiUi 8 based on Android 6.0 and this is a slight disappointment – it would have been great if the phone came with Android 7.0 out of the box. MiUi is one of the most feature rich interfaces available for Android users today in our opinion.

You can customize almost all the features as per your needs which is ideal for amateur as well as experience users. Mi preloads a few of its own apps along with Kindle, Facebook, WPS office, Flipkart, Swiftkey and PhonePe app – all the third-party apps can be removed if not required.

All the usual features including Second space, dual apps and fingerprint lock for apps is also present. Xiaomi also announced that an Android 7.0 update for the phone is in the works and will be available in the coming months.

Camera is another strong point for the Redmi 4 – it is as good as the Redmi Note 4 camera in our opinion. It takes excellent images in daylight as well as indoors and does surprisingly well with dynamic lighting.

In low light, the images suffer from visible noise, but they are still good enough to view on the phone. MiUi offers several shooting modes including a Manual mode and a Tilt shift mode on the Redmi 4. Its front 5MP camera is one of the best you can get in this price range.

Like the rear camera, it works best in daylight whereas indoors it loses some details. Video recording maxes out at full HD resolution and adjusts well to any change in lighting – you can enable tap to focus option for more control if required.

Other impressive features on the Redmi 4 include its loud and clear audio output (from both voice call and loud speaker, accurate and fast fingerprint scanner and a superb IR sensor.

For its price, there is nothing in the sub Rs 10,000 price that comes close to the Redmi 4. However, for the Redmi 4’s 4GB variant that is priced at RS 10,999, Xiaomi’s own Redmi Note 4 will be a tough competition to beat.